The present invention relates generally to carrier racks for supporting elongated objects on pick-up trucks and, more specifically, to such racks which are collapsible from an upright position to a position where a portion of the rack rests upon the sidewalls of the truckbed.
Various racks have long been known for installation over the bed of a pick-up truck to enable the truck to transport elongated articles such as ladders, pipes and the like which are too long to be accommodated in the truck bed. Such racks allow the articles to extend over the cab of the truck and still be adequately and stably supported over their entire length.
A majority of known racks for pick-ups comprise at least four upright members secured in some fashion to the bed of the truck and a plurality of cross-members extending between the tops of the upright members, both above the sidewalls of the bed and across the width of the bed. Examples of such racks are shown in U.S. Pat. No. 2,947,566 to Tower, U.S. Pat. No. 3,765,713 to Suitt, and U.S. Pat. No. 4,509,787 to Knaack. While such racks function satisfactorily for their intended purpose, it is oftentimes necessary to remove the rack so that large or odd shaped objects can be carried in the bed of the truck. The generally fixed construction of the rack renders the task of removal quite cumbersome and storage of the rack after removal presents a problem. If the uprights are fixedly secured to the truck bed, the removal of the rack is even more complicated.
Collapsible racks for pick-up trucks are also known in the art as exemplified by U.S. Pat. No. 3,460,864 to Piercy and U.S. Pat. No. 4,057,281 to Garrett. While the collapsible nature of the racks eliminates some of the problems associated with the removal of racks of fixed or semi-fixed construction, their structure tends to be complicated, and the process of collapsing the rack is time-consuming, and storage of some rack components is inconvenient.